I.N.D.I.A BLOC LIES IN TATTERS

Mamata snubs Congress, to contest all Bengal LS seats

- SUPROTIM MUKHERJEE

Barely hours before Congress scion Rahul Gandhi was to enter West Bengal for the next leg of his Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra, his I.N.D.I.A. bloc colleague and Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee publicly dismissed any chance of a seat-sharing deal between the two parties and declared that her party would contest all 42 Lok Sabha seats in the State.

“I have had no discussions with the Congress. I have always said that in Bengal, we will fight alone. I gave them (the Congress) many proposals... but they rejected them. I am not concerned about what will be done in the (rest of the) country... but we are a secular party and, in Bengal, we alone will defeat the BJP,” Mamata Banerjee said, adding that she would only consider a pan-India alliance with the Congress after results are declared. Banerjee’s words deliver what appears to be a final blow to hopes for the two parties – seen as important members of the I.N.D.I.A. Opposition bloc – will reach any agreement.

The Trinamool vs Congress squabble over seatsharing, and the larger picture of how the Congress-led I.N.D.I.A. bloc might most effectively defeat Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his BJP, has rumbled on for weeks with no apparent resolution.